1.2 History of Bronze Age research in Scotland

This is a brief and selective summary of research in, and chronology of, the Bronze Age in Scotland, both as set out in purely Scottish studies and in those covering the whole of Britain that display significant Scottish content or implications. A simplified version of the latest relative and absolute chronology published for southern Britain is included below (see Table 1) as an indication of the chronological parameters. The extent to which this chronology is relevant to Scotland will be discussed at various points below.